Seattle Police Release Additional Images From Kurt Cobain’s Suicide

Kurt Cobain (1967 – 1994) performing with Nirvana on “MTV Unplugged” in New York City, November 18, 1993.

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The Seattle Police Department released more photos from the scene of Kurt Cobain’s suicide in 1994, including an image of the Nirvana frontman’s hand wearing a hospital bracelet.

According to police, Cobain died from a self inflicted gunshot wound nearly twenty years ago. In two photos shared with the Wall Street Journal by the SPD, a portion of the singer’s body can be seen, including a hospital identification around the wrist, and the second photo shows the musician’s foot near what appears to be shotgun shells.

“Our department regularly receives inquiries about the Cobain case—both through the public disclosure process and via our Twitter feed—and, with the anniversary approaching, we anticipated we would receive additional questions about the case from the public and news outlets,” a spokesperson for the Seattle Police Department’s Public Affairs office told the Wall Street Journal. “We wanted to engage with the community in the spirit of transparency and requested that one of our homicide detectives—cold case detective, Mike Ciesynski—review the case file to assist us in fielding questions about the case. This was not a “reopening” of the original death investigation.”

The undeveloped photographs were discovered by Ciesynski after being held in storage for nearly 20 years.

“Due to regulations surrounding the preservation of evidence, the department developed the photos after they were discovered by Det. Ciesynski, who determined the photos did not capture anything new or significant about the case.There are a number of other, more graphic photos, which our dept. believes are exempt from public disclosure, which have not been released,” the public affairs department spokesperson told the Wall Street Journal.